Afghan exhibition to open on August 6

Australia's war in Afghanistan will be documented in a new exhibition to open soon at the Australian War Memorial.

War Memorial director Brendan Nelson said the new exhibition would open on August 6 and has been put together in a fraction of the time usually needed for such an event featuring artifacts, images and stories from the conflict.

When he took over as director in December, staff advised an exhibition on Afghanistan would take years to prepare.

"My very strong view, supported by the chairman and the council, is that we need to present the Afghanistan story and we need to do it now," he said.

"Australians have had some 25,000 deployments to Afghanistan over the course of the last 12 years and many courageous and intense things have been done on our behalf in our name. We owe it to them to tell Australians that story now."

Dr Nelson made the announcement at the Memorial on Tuesday where exhibition sponsor, defence company Boeing, presented a Scan Eagle unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) used by Australian troops in Afghanistan and Iraq for the display.

Scan Eagle was the first type of UAV deployed by the Australian Defence Force, a technology now widely used.